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Students from different regions of the Philippines gathered for the 4th Aquaculture Research Talk held on 6 July 2026 at SEAFDEC/AQD Tigbauan Main Station, Iloilo to gain valuable insights from researchers and scientists while exploring career opportunities in research. A total of 125 participants, composed of university and senior high school students along with several faculty members, attended the event in person, which carried the theme “Dream, Discover, Dive In: Inspiring the Next Generation of Changemakers.” The research talk featured presentations by Associate Scientist Dr. Joana Joy Huervana, Researcher Erish Estante-Superio, and Scientist Dr. Mary Anne Mandario, who shared their research experiences, scientific discoveries, and career journeys in aquaculture. Dr. Huervana recounted how her curiosity about science led to a …

SEAFDEC/AQD inaugurated three facilities on 9 July 2026 at its Tigbauan Main Station, marking a PHP 87-million (USD 1.4 million) investment in research, production, and technology transfer efforts for whiteleg shrimp, giant freshwater prawn, and mangrove crab. The PHP 50-million (USD 820,000) Whiteleg Shrimp Hatchery and Grow-out Complex is the largest of the three projects. It is designed to produce up to 60 million whiteleg shrimp postlarvae and about 24 metric tons of market-size shrimp annually. It includes facilities for broodstock maturation, spawning, larval rearing, algal culture, and six circular concrete grow-out tanks—four with a capacity of 265 tons each and two with a capacity of 471 tons each. Another major addition is the PHP 12-million (USD 200,000) giant freshwater …

As part of its week-long 53rd anniversary celebration, SEAFDEC/AQD organized environmental stewardship, community outreach activities. The celebration kicked off on 3 July 2026 with a coastal cleanup at Barangay Buyu-an, Tigbauan, Iloilo, where SEAFDEC/AQD’s Main Station is located. A total of 229 SEAFDEC/AQD employees, on-the-job trainees, and volunteers participated in the cleanup, collecting approximately 600 kg of trash. Volunteers included representatives from the local government units of Tigbauan and Guimbal, the Philippine Coast Guard substations in Tigbauan and Guimbal, the Tigbauan Philippine National Police, the Bureau of Fire Protection, Guardians Brotherhood Inc., and Kinaadman Elementary School Inc. On 7 July, SEAFDEC/AQD also conducted a blood donation drive and an optical mission at its Tigbauan Main Station. The blood donation drive, …

Most people would not expect a scientific breakthrough to emerge from pond mud. But in 2017, a routine culture experiment at SEAFDEC/AQD in Iloilo took an unexpected turn. Then researcher Dr. Mary Anne Mandario stocked culture tanks with jelly cocoons, the egg capsules of mudworms, and expected little more than another round of observations. Instead, the worms multiplied far beyond what Dr. Mandario (now a scientist as of this writing) expected. The dramatic increase caught her attention. More intriguing, however, was the appearance of two distinct polychaete species. One appeared familiar. The other did not resemble any species she could identify. Rather than dismissing the anomaly, Dr. Mandario pursued it. Specimens were sent to Dr. Christopher Glasby, a polychaete taxonomist …